Inhibitory potential of iRGD peptide-conjugated garcinol-loaded biodegradable nanoparticles in rat colorectal carcinoma

Targeted drug delivery has become attention in chemotherapy during the last decade. The principle of chemotherapy seeks maximum effect to the desired site and the minimum impact to other undesired sites of action. The nanoparticulated drug delivery system progressed a lot in this aspect in the last twenty years. Plant-derived natural products and their semisynthetic analogues boosted chemotherapy through their excellent mechanistic approach to killing cancer cells. Keeping in mind the available molecular targets in colorectal carcinoma (CRC), in this article, we proposed a peptide conjugated novel polymeric nanoparticle to deliver garcinol against colorectal carcinoma. Integrin binding peptide iRGD, sequence c(CRGDKGPDC), has been selected as a targeting moiety, as most CRC overexpress integrins. We encapsulated garcinol in biodegradable polymeric nanoparticle (PLGA)-conjugated with iRGD peptide on the particles' surface, and analyzed its (iRGD-GAR-NP's) in vitro and in vivo antineoplastic potential against CRC in a comparative way with gracinol (GAR) and garcinol-loaded PLGA nanoparticles (GAR-NP). In vitro cellular studies on human CRC cell lines, HCT116 and HT-29, revealed the superior cytotoxic potential of iRGD-GAR-NP over GAR and GAR-NP. The IC50 value on HCT116 cells was reduced by 2.3 times compared to GAR upon the application of iRGD-GAR-NP. At equivalent doses, iRGD-GAR-NP induced higher apoptosis in HCT116 cells and caused blockage of cell cycle at G0/G1 phase of the same. iRGD-GAR-NP increased the apoptotic population of HCT116 cells by 2.5 times compared to GAR. In vivo biodistribution study uncoiled the ability of GAR-NP and iRGD-GAR-NP to accumulate in the colons of dimethyl hydrazine-induced CRC-bearing Sprague-Dawely (SD) rats. In vivo antitumor efficacy study demonstrated the better effect of iRGD-GAR-NP to reduce CRC tumor progression in experimental animals. The survival rate of animals was also increased by 166% in the case of iRGD-GAR-NP compared to CRC-bearing animals received no treatment.